The pain in Maine

Roger Sowell (13:48:55) :

I have also wondered about other anecdotal/empirical evidence as a measure of warming/cooling, e.g. citrus groves being grown farther and farther south if cooling dominates, permafrost line extent in Canada, ice-road duration in the Arctic, ice fishing season duration, number of school closing days due to snow/cold, sales quantities of Arctic diesel fuel, the number of tire chain days due to snow, the number of ski-resort days open per year, perhaps a few others. I am aware that some ski resorts manufacture artificial snow, but if the air is too warm the snow does not form.
Is anybody else following any of that?

I track snow fall and snow depth days (like heating degree days only simpler) for several folks around New England. My conclusion is that comparing those is as foolish as trying to link North Atlantic hurricane activity to climate. We have very wide swings from year to year. Some years my data tracked Derry (30 miles away) well, other years the rain/snow line frequently was between us.
Today I have 19″ of snow on the ground. Last year I had the same. Snow Depth Days (the sum of all the daily snow depths) is 279 this season, it was 761 last year. Major snows in December 2007, big January thaw in 2008. Quieter and colder this year, pretty much in line with Joe D’Aleo’s forecast.
See http://wermenh.com/sdd/ for more and links to annual data.
We like to look forward to “ice out” dates on the major lakes, that’s also too variable to be much use except over a several decades.

Roger Sowell (03:32:43) :
There is something in the supposed ocean acidification that does not quite sit with me, it rings my “how can THAT be?” bell. Perhaps the problem there is in the accepted (or perhaps contextual) use of “equilibrium.”
I see 3 problems with ‘acidification’.
1) We’ve had much higher CO2 before, why did coral et. al. not go extinct then? The ‘disastrous’ part seems hobbled by an existence proof to the contrary.
2) The ocean is just chock full of all sorts of ‘buffer salts’. It would take a lot to get a significant pH shift. Maybe they are just counting H2CO3 in and not actual pH as ‘acidification’? Any significant acid conditions ought to result in more CO2 outgassing, IIRC. Data on long term CO2 concentration in the ocean ought to directly tell you the degree of ingress, if any.
3) There are an awful lot of precipitated alkaline materials on the planet. I’d expect any acidification to result in fairly quick neutralization. (From Ca+ and Mg+ et. al. containing rocks to manganese nodules to ???) There is one heck of a lot of ocean bottom out there. So is there any evidence of a differential pH between top layers and others?
Seems very odd that the MSL data from Boulder shows the Pacific just offshore San Francisco is on a decreasing trend. The HCTB (how can THAT be?) bell is ringing again… This is very important data since California enacted the Climate Warming Initiative (AB 32) to stop sea level rise, among other goals.
See! It worked!! 8-}
Given that coastal California is a very active geologic region, and that the coastal mountains are still having uplift, I would not use it as a measure of what is going up and what is going down… When the plate under Indonesia let go in 2004 and made the big tsunami the ocean bottom popped up several meters in one go. When the San Andreas last moved under my feet I think it was about 6 feet sideways (don’t know the uplift if any).
From:
http://earthquake.usgs.gov/regional/states/events/1989_10_18.php
Six feet of right-lateral strike-slip and 4 feet of reverse-slip was inferred from geodetic data. The only surface fracturing that might be attributed to primary tectonic faulting occurred along a trace of the San Andreas near Mount Madonna Road in the Corralitos area, where en echelon cracks showed 2 centimeters of right-lateral displacement.
Most likely it’s that the ocean is cooling, but it would take other measurements to prove that California is not going up… it’s certainly slip sliding away 😉
There are some empirical data available also that can be used to corroborate the climate warming or cooling trends. One that I follow is sales volume of home heating oil in the U.S.
Orange juice futures follow the weather in Florida and South Texas most of the time. Spikes are unusual freezes or hurricanes. Wheat futures follow global weather as each region production is predicted (with some bias to U.S. data and reflecting freezes that kill planted wheat before harvest). I would also expect road salt sales data to closely follow coldness anywhere east of the West coast.
Frankly, if there were any shift of 30 year weather zones, I’d expect Sunset to know about it and be changing their Garden Book. I think they may depend on all the county ag departments to tell them changes is first / last freeze days. Worth a call though.

From:
http://www.jsonline.com/news/wisconsin/36815194.html
By Scott Williams of the Journal Sentinel
Posted: Dec. 28, 2008
[…]
With another season of heavy snow already stretching some road salt supplies, Ohio state officials are calling for increased cooperation with their Midwest neighbors in managing government’s most precious winter commodity.
[…]
The move toward regional coordination is seen as a possible solution to a conundrum facing local governments in Wisconsin as they confront a second consecutive winter with repeated snowfall tapping salt stockpiles.
[…]
Despite procuring 1,300 tons of road salt this year – 200 tons more than last year – Greendale already has used about 30% of its supply and has announced plans to curtail salting on some residential streets.
Michaels expressed doubts that the village could purchase more salt if snow continues bombarding area roadways the way it has the first few weeks of winter.
“That’s what concerns us – that it’s so early,” he said.
Last year’s near-record accumulations in Wisconsin created widespread shortages of road salt and sharp price increases that had some cities, counties and other government agencies paying as much as $134 a ton – more than three times the normal price.
Ohio investigators released their report Dec. 15, saying that road salt consumption in Wisconsin and other Midwestern states last year was 700,000 tons above average combined. Those same states boosted advance orders dramatically this year, again straining supplies and creating a demand spike, the report says.

E.M.Smith (23:32:38) :
Roger Sowell (22:13:14) : I also do not see how the sea surface changes when the sea floor is shifted by an earthquake.

I should also add that my original intent was not to say the Indonesia sea floor lift changed sea surface height, but rather that land can move vertically a lot in seismic events. (I might also add that when one chunk of land goes up, even if under water, nearby land may shift too – general uplift or counter trend down if it relaxes stress on a nearby area. Basically, the land moves. Sometimes a lot.)